The Choice (He Doesn't Have)
by skiesfallithurts
Summary: "A crooked cop. That's who you are, Donnie. You've become this the moment you dialed those digits. The moment you called me."


_How has it come to this? _

Donald doesn't know.

_"__You didn't expect that, did you, Frankie? Or should I say, 'Agent Ressler'? You thought I wouldn't find out?"_

Ressler is gripping the steering wheel tighter, casting a glance at the traffic light.

Red.

Time seems to stall forever. A spasm is seizing his throat. He takes a deep breath. One. Another.

_Calm down._

_Focus._

_"__I hope you didn't have breakfast?"_

His only meal is a bottle of whiskey before going to bed. Instead of a lullaby.

_"__The parking lot, as usual. Wait for my further instructions."_

Yellow.

Donald's fingers are drumming _staccato_ on the steering wheel, his wet palms slipping off its shabby cover. An old-fashioned headrest's massage case stings the back of his head. The windshield is dull, scratched. Thirteen—Donald has counted—a devil's dozen of grazes, scrapes and rubs. It's stuffy and hot inside; unlike the FBI's SUV, the stolen clunker isn't supplied with an AC. It's a miracle this bucket is still up and running.

Green.

Donald, his moves fixed and steady, is pressing both accelerator and clutch, shifting the gear. The car takes off, its engine grunting and burping. It reeks of spent fuel inside the cabin. A drop of sweat slides off Donald's forehead. Rattled, he wipes it off, and then smooths his already sleek ginger hair. He looks at the rear view mirror. The tobacco-green eyes are staring back at him with a hunted wolf look in them.

"Wee-o, wee-o, wee-o!"

He shudders at the siren wailing, but keeps the speed steady, not drawing any unnecessary attention to himself.

A fire truck._ False alarm._

Exhale. Inhale. Exhale. Inhale. His FBI's credentials are cutting him through the inside left pocket in his jacket. Their corners are poking his chest, covered under a perfectly ironed striped shirt, and the golden eagle with the embossed "FBI" insignia under it is melting his skin. An impeccable knot of his tie is strangling him, and Donald, not taking it anymore, hastily pulls it back to the side. Steering with his one hand, he takes off the left sleeve of his jacket, and then another, his eyes on the road.

From the tiniest gap in once toned window—he can't risk being seen—it smells of hot-dogs. Donald presses the fist into his mouth, his teeth digging deep into the knuckles, trying not to inhale the stench of burned buns and rare sausages.

Block by block. Block by block. Museums, theaters, diners, coffee shops, movies, hotels. Crossing by crossing. Until he hears the noise of the drills battering the brains out. The noise he knows too well. Hell, he almost can tell a difference between a hammer drill and an impact driver now.

This parking lot isn't different from others. His agenda for now is to switch this goddamn bucket on wheels for another, even more decrepit, with a "delivery package" inside, zipped in the black body bag.

_"__No… I don't… I can't! I'm a…"_

_"__A crooked cop. That's who you are, Donnie. You've become this the moment you dialed those digits. The moment you called me."_

Donald, a strained smile on his face, opens and then shuts his credentials before a security guy. The guy, yawning and occasionally rubbing his right eye, gives him the pass card. Ressler, dropping a polite "Thank you!", enters through the just lifted red-and-white barrier.

Opening the car window has been a mistake—the stench of piss and concrete dust is nauseating. The white paint is covering the graffiti on the walls. Donald is looking for the necessary isle. 30...35... 47… Finally, his car halts at the "94" sign. The engine's off. Wiping his fingerprints off all possible surfaces, Donald holds back the tears. His nose is itching. He hasn't cried since school—he could always stand up for those who were being bullied, and he would always kick the bullies' asses too.

His face now burning, the vision is a blur.

God, he's so ashamed! Unbearably embarrassed. Humiliated. And petrified. Every time, each bone of his body paralyzed, he is petrified of what he's going to do. Of what he's been doing already for four months. And God only knows how much longer he's going to keep it like that. Or how much longer he can stand it.

_A crooked cop._ That's who he is. The one he's always despised, loathed with all his being. A coward and a scum. Rotting in a jail—that's the place he belongs now to.

Checking if he hasn't left anything in the cabin, Donald gets out of the car, slamming the door so hard the echo is bouncing off the parking lot's walls. Pulling a phone out of his pocket, he opens the incoming messages.

**Toyota Corolla. Red. KDG 696.**

In a matter of time the car's found—his eyes have been trained for this—at the last isle, a neighbor to a weary-looking silver "Buick".

_Bz-zrrr-zrr. _

The vibration almost sets Donald's temper off. He grips the phone tighter in his hand.

With all his heart Donald is hoping it's the office.

**Unknown Number.**

_Fuck._

"How are we doing, Donald?" Henry Prescott is clowning, accentuating "Donald". Ressler, listening to Presscott's voice on the speaker—a voice he hates so much it's almost hard to breathe at times—is biting his lip until the metallic taste rolls over his tongue. "All good?" Prescott asks, sneering at Ressler.

"Fuck you," Ressler spits the words out, barely holding himself not to smash the burner against the asphalt. "I swear, I'm gonna find a way to make you pay. They'll put you away for what you did. You'll be gone, permanently."

Prescott's low voice turns into whisper. Intimate. Indecent. Dirty.

"Even if so, we'll both go down, Donnie. You know what they're doing to cops in there, right? Especially to those with such a pretty face as yours?"

Donald doesn't need to see Prescott to know what he looks like right now. How casually he presses the phone to his ear, grinning, his smile wide and lecherous. How his lips are moving, and his Adam's apple goes up and down to each sound he utters. How his eyes—pitch black—are looking at him, Donald, dragging and sucking in every breathing thing around. There's nothing in them. Not a single human thing or emotion.

Prescott never shows his hands—whenever he and Ressler meet, those are in black gloves. And Prescott is always wearing black—a shirt, suit, coat. Like a hawk, predacious and lordly, its claws digging into the prey, the beak grinding through the epithelium, muscles, and bones to get to the guts.

"I hope you die, you piece of scum," Ressler half spits, half breathes the words out, sauntering to the car's trunk.

A lot of times he has tried to confess. A lot of times he has turned off the fire alarm, opened the window, and lit a match, burning the confession. Although every, every fucking time he, wiping off his bloodshot eyes, has remembered about consequences. About the dead body of the National Security Advisor Laurel Hitchin, stalling his career since the day he has found out she's a part of the conspiracy against her own country.

Hitchin has taken his badge from him, according to her own words, "as a control measure", and suggested to earn it back by "a much more pleasant and satisfying way for both parties".

Donald does not remember giving her a slap. He does not remember her to collapse, losing the balance on her high heels. The only thing left in his memory is a slow-motion frame of the crimson spot sprawled on the white carpet at her head.

"In that case Laurel's body is gonna tell everyone quite a story. The story of how you cowardly dumped her there. Still warm, bleeding. You never called it in. Never called an ambulance. Never left her a chance..." Prescott is whispering again, his voice getting huskier like he is hooking up a girl for the night, looking for a cheap treat. At times Ressler thinks that the control, the power, the dead bodies, all this is his turn-on. He barely hears the rest of what Prescott is saying. "...They'll find traces of your DNA on her, by the way. And it's not gonna be her face, trust me," Prescott gives him a hoarse, jeering laugh.

"I... WHAT?! How you even… Fuck." It comes to Ressler he has single-handedly given Prescott the access to the FBI's database.

To give a criminal the access to the FBI's database or the being put away for life? If someone had asked Donald this three years ago, what would he choose, he'd, of course, choose jail time. However, right now the choice doesn't seem obvious to him.

_Because there is none._

"That's right. Now, Donnie, be a good boy and open the trunk."

Pressing the phone between his shoulder and ear, Donald, silently wishing Prescott go and fuck himself, complies.

"Casings are packed separately. Left from the last week. Don't lose anything," Prescott sneers, his laugh low and creaky, the sound of it is giving Ressler goosebumps. "As you might see, today's beauty is in pieces. See you at my place. In an hour."

"An hour?! It's two and a half just to get here!"

"Try harder," Prescott is whispering again. Ressler shudders with disgust. "You want to keep your ass at the FBI?" Prescott sighs flirtatiously into the speaker. Ressler's fingers are digging into the phone's back cover. "Huh, Donald? You want it, I know."

Donald, his breathing frantic and heavy, doesn't say a word.

_You can't deny the truth._

Nothing—he has nothing but this job. Nothing is left anymore.

"See you soon, Donald."

The moment Prescott hangs up, Ressler throws the burner down the asphalt and squashes it with his shoe. A brittle cover is crunching, split in two. It would go to waste anyway. Prescott won't leave him without a way to keep tabs on him—no doubt, a new burner is already set and waits for him in the Toyota's glove compartment.

Donald tries not to look at the transparent bags with severed human parts lying under the spare tire. Covering the bags with the tire, Ressler shuts the lid of the trunk and then gets in the car.


End file.
